Little Italy II — Restaurant in Mena

After researching the area I found this place and they had one item that I could order Eggplant Ala Ari and with the request of no cheese substitute pasta for grilled veggies would still be vegan. It comes with rolls and a side salad but you can skip the rolls if you are a stern vegan because she was unsure if they would have had any animal byproducts in them ( garlic sauce was on them and not sure if it is butter or oil ) minus the cheese, egg, and croutons (wasn't sure if they were vegan or not since they didn't make them) the side salad and we were okay with the house dressing which is a oil vinaigrette and tomato base. Slightly sweet but overall good (she did warn me about the dressing being slightly sweet ahead of time which I was okay with cause I'm a fan of things like that)Portions here are sharable you definitely get your money's worth. My fur-babies liked their grilled chicken with no seasoning. Chloe the waitress who took my order and rang me up was a friendly smiling face from the very moment I walked into the restaurant to the second I left. I enjoyed her bright friendly demeanor. She made sure to ask plenty of questions to make sure I was going to be happy with what I was ordering and I'm so glad she didn't assume anything because unless you ask or (research) you never truly know. Even I who happen to know a lot about culinary arts and nutrition don't know or remember everything and that is okay. I also enjoyed that they had a bragging board that displayed local peoples achievements and a board helping a local shelter get fellow dogs adopted. It's the perfect mix of small town charm with big...

It's Sunday in Mena which means there are only 4 restaurants open after 4pm. Bummer. We decided to give Little Italy another shot after last time not being too pleased. Today's dinner was awesome! Husband had the steak and shrimp, I got the tour of Italy with diablo sauce instead of regular marinara. Our dinner salads were excellent. The steak was perfectly seasoned and cooked. The shrimp...was the best shrimp I've ever had. The smell was mouth watering. Whatever they're doing to those shrimp should be how every restaurant prepares them. My pastas were fabulous. Excellent flavor of both sauces. The diablo was to die for. chef kiss the lasagna....could have been better. But the other two pastas made up for it. We both have leftovers for lunch tomorrow and will go back again. Great job!

One more thing, great service Toni. My husband is one of those guys that needs a pitcher of whatever hes drinking so he doesnt run out so quickly and you are the only waitress we've ever had to bring him two waters after seeing that he drank the first one so quickly. That is some primo service in my book. I was a waitress for several years at different restaurants and seeing you do that proved to me that you are observant and good at what you...

We came with a party of 3. We ordered and noticed 2 parties after us was served their food after us. I asked if they forgot our order then magically it came out a few minutes later. 2 of us ordered “Tour of Italy”. The chicken parmesan has no chicken and was just breading. The lasagna was maybe 2 layers at best and the Alfredo was blah. And for a lunch special for $22 I’d expect more, even Olive Garden blows it out the park compared to this place. We experienced nothing but nasty food and poor service from here. One of the guys I was with only took 2 bites of his “Tour of Italy” and said the chicken parmesan tasted spoiled, atleast he had chicken in his meal. And the waitress asked if he wanted to take it to go and he said no. A good waitress would have realized something was wrong. Especially for a “lunch special” dish that cost $22. And she didn’t even get our checks right, I paid for an order of fried ravioli’s that another person ordered at my table. Which brought my total to $40+ dollars for one person, what a joke. Don’t come here, bad service, bad food. Don’t recommend eating here. The bread had decent flavor but was burnt. 🤦🏼‍♂️ Wished I...